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LISHARY of CONGRESS 
Two Conies deceive* 

JUL 6 )»08 

CLASS>/9 XXC No, 

GOPY 8. ' 



Copyright, 1908, by 

The International Committee of 

Young Men's Christian Associations 



WORKING TOGETHER 

INTRODUCTION 
FRED B. SMITH, Secretary of Religious 
Work Department, International Committee 



WORKING TOGETHER 



M E^33333£j3 NY MAN, anywhere, doing 
&j US God's work in anyway is 

J\ h serving the Church. The 
&2 jLM» (ft mystical conception of "The 
& & Church" as being only 

BBS>SSEB>2E^E within the walls dedicated 
by special prayer has dissolved in the pres- 
ence of the greater issues of the Kingdom. 
A new and enlarged interpretation of the 
Church is fundamental to best results in the 
multitude of Christian organizations. 

There is perhaps no more vital issue in 
church life during the days at hand and to 
come than that of relationships as they are 
involved in the ever-increasing number of 
societies within the Church, and, indeed, or- 
ganizations within organizations. It is 
rather significant that, in the period of de- 
nominational amalgamation, the subdivisions 
into special committees, clubs, and societies 
should be so insistently increased. 

What is to be the effect upon the Church 
as a unit, is a question anxiously asked. The 
effect is to be largely determined by the atti- 
5 



WORKING TOGETHER 

tude of the Church toward these organiza- 
tions. A sympathetic attitude of coopera- 
tion will reduce danger to the minimum and 
reap the maximum of good. A reverse atti- 
tude is sure to cause friction and unneces- 
sary loss of power and results. 

"The Church" must see the deeper, 
broader meaning of "There is that scattereth 
and increaseth yet more. And there is that 
withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth 
only to want." "The liberal soul should be 
made fat." If Church leaders can maintain 
this attitude warmly and sincerely, there is 
nothing to be feared from the supplementing 
organizations. However important this 
Church attitude is, it is vastly more impor- 
tant that all of these kindred societies shall 
fully realize their place of subservience to 
the largest interests of the Church, as the 
conserving power in establishing the King- 
dom. Societies of many names may rise and 
have their day and pass away, but the 
"Church," the Bride of Christ, will live 
forever, and it is the clearest mark of super- 
ficiality that talks of the Church losing its 
power. It therefore becomes of the utmost 
importance that these divisions of the army 
learn clearly what the plan of campaign for 
6 



NEED FOR RESTATEMENT 

the army, as a whole, is and then learn what 
special responsibility is to be assumed by each 
group and then, with intelligence and loyalty 
to the whole, press the battle. 

In the correlation of principles and 
methods, the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation, as a department of Christian effort, 
has had a most harmonious relation to the 
Church throughout its history. However, in 
the unparalleled growth of the past decade 
and in the vision of the ensuing years that 
seem so fraught with ever greater possibili- 
ties, a clearer statement of these relations is 
timely. The Church was never more pressed 
to have certain types of work carried on 
than at the present, and some of these can 
be done by no existing agency except the 
Young Men's Christian Association. There- 
fore, it is imperative that Church office 
bearers shall view the Association in sober 
judgment and give warm sympathy to its 
place in the Kingdom. 

Likewise, it is timely that the men of in- 
fluence in the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation shall, in the hour of greatest power, 
be strongly reminded of the fact that the 
organization they direct is a supplementary 
7 



WORKING TOGETHER 

one and must ever be ready to yield to the 
greatest good of the Kingdom as a whole. 

The articles following are of such value 
that more than ordinary attention ought to 
be given them by readers. Each was written 
by a man of large enough caliber to see both 
sides of the question, and yet each writes 
with deep conviction from his own point of 
contact. No churchman could have been 
accorded more authority than Dr. Bosworth, 
a teacher of ministers. All loyal friends of 
the Church must accept his statements as a 
fair index of the real value of the Associa- 
tion to the Church. An almost perfect com- 
plement is found in the other author, Reno 
Hutchinson. His pages are made ever more 
impressive by his tragic death. In life he 
was a profound thinker and also an active 
achiever with but few equals. All genuine 
friends of the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation will gladly give ample consideration 
to his views. 

Careful study of these ought to make the 
articulation of workers in any and all Church 
organizations more perfect. 



HOW CAN THE ASSOCI- 
ATION IN THE FUTURE 
RENDER THE LARGEST 
SERVICE TO THE CHURCH? 

EDWARD I. BOSWORTH 

Dean of Oberlin Theological Seminary 



9 FUTURE SERVICE TO THE CHURCH | 



B 



B^SaSSKH EFORE we can determine 
what service the Young 
Men's Christian Association 
may render to the Church, 
we must determine what the 
Church is, or ought to be, 
trying to do. The nature of the service to 
be rendered is determined by the character 
of the thing that must be done. What, then, 
is the great work of the Church to which she 
summons the help of such organizations as 
the Young Men's Christian Association? 

This is no merely academic or literary 
question. In our day of intense passion for 
the real and of impatience with the super- 
fluous, every institution and custom must, 
once more in self-defense, be able on quick 
and insistent demand to show why it should 
continue to be. There is a kind of civilized 
savageness in the terribly earnest mood of 
our age which will either kill or abandon any 
institution that cannot prove its right to 
continued existence. Nothing is so sacred 
or aged as to evade the insistent question, 
11 



WORKING TOGETHER 

"Why should you be here?" The Church, 
the Law of the Land, organized Government, 
everything must once more show its reason 
for being. Why should the Church call men 
in from the golf links, workmen away from 
their club and union rooms, men, women and 
children away from their homes to attend her 
services? Why should she ask for millions of 
dollars to construct her buildings and pay 
her preachers and teachers? The answer is 
this : The Church is training men for the 
Kingdom of God. The Church is the only 
organization whose business it is to train 
men, women and children to take effective 
part in the developing civilization of God's 
New Order. The Church so considered is not 
the Kingdom of God. It is the organization 
that provides the Kingdom of God with men. 
"The Kingdom of God" is a Jewish phrase 
which, in its wider Christian application, 
covers all the activities and interests of an 
entire civilization in which men treat each 
other as sons of God. It includes great in- 
dustrial enterprises, great fleets sailing 
peacefully between the continents to do the 
international business of fair and cooperative 
commerce. It has place for great inventors, 
skillful to devise appliances that shall bring 
12 



GOD'S WILL ON EARTH 

into the service of man the undiscovered 
forces of his physical environment. There 
will be ever enlarging occupation for patient 
scholars, wise statesmen, gifted artists, great 
authors — great multitudes of friendly work- 
men. There will be no more vicious idleness 
on the part of some, who must be supported 
by the painful overwork of others. There 
will be no more cursing, no more sobbing, but 

All men's good 
Be each man's rule, and universal Peace 
Lie like a shaft of light across the land, 
And like a lane of beams athwart the sea, 
Through all the circle of the golden year. 

There will be such highly developed sensi- 
tiveness to our spiritual environment as shall 
make the transition from the visible to the 
invisible world an easy step, and so death lose 
the last vestige of its terror. There will be 
such inter-penetration of the life of heaven 
and earth as shall make the distinction be- 
tween them disappear. When the Kingdom 
has come God's will is to be done on earth as 
in heaven. The spiritual and the physical 
worlds will be found in personal experience 
to be one world. 

It is the function of the Church, I say, to 
train men, women and children so to live as 
13 



WORKING TOGETHER 

to promote such a civilization, not to give 
them the technical education requisite for the 
varied occupations of that civilization, but 
to produce in them the spirit requisite for 
the New Order. The Church is the organiza- 
tion which holds steadily before men Jesus 
Christ's vision of the New Order of Brotherly 
Sons of the Heavenly Father; the organiza- 
tion which holds steadily before men the 
vision of Jesus Christ as the living per- 
sonality through vital connection with whom 
they shall be able to live the life of the New 
Order; the organization which combines the 
disciples of Jesus Christ into a spiritual fel- 
lowship, in which they inspire and encourage 
each other to make their lives true to the 
vision. The Church calls men, women and 
children together on the Sabbath day in 
order that on Monday, in home, school, farm, 
factory, office, they may more effectively 
introduce into the developing civilization of 
the Kingdom of God the spirit of Jesus 
Christ. The Church may do many things in 
the process of producing men, women and 
children of the spirit suitable for the King- 
dom of God. But to provide the Kingdom of 
God with such trained personalities is the 
great purpose of its being. 
14 



FROM MANY ONE 

Other organizations, too, may hold this 
aim as preeminent among lesser aims for 
certain classes. Our Young Men's Chris- 
tian Association aims to accomplish this end 
for young men; the Salvation Army for 
certain social classes. But no organization 
except the Church gathers to itself men, 
women and children from all social classes 
for the accomplishment of this great pur- 
pose. Furthermore, all other organizations, 
like the Association or the Salvation Army, 
feel the need of turning their recruits over to 
the Church for its training. 

Now what service can the Young Men's 
Christian Association render to the Church in 
the effort of the Church to accomplish its 
great purpose? 

I. 

The Association can render distinguished 
service to the Church by assisting different 
sections of the Church to greater unity. Just 
how far this unifying process among the 
churches is to go, and just how the Associa- 
tion is to render the service, no one can now 
fully foretell. But the present marked ten- 
dency on the part of the Church towards 
15 



WORKING TOGETHER 

unity, and the present highly effective or- 
ganization of the Association are not con- 
temporaneous facts without providential con- 
nection. The connection between these two 
facts is all the more apparent when we re- 
member that all the principal sections of the 
so-called Evangelical Church, and many of 
its minor sections, are largely represented in 
the Association. A great many persons who 
are members of these various sections of the 
Church are at the same time members of the 
Association. 

The situation in the churches is this. In 
the past there have been what seemed to be 
good historic reasons for the development of 
different denominations. Some neglected 
truth needed the emphasis which a denomina- 
tion especially honoring this particular truth 
could give it. But in time the neglected 
truth came to be sufficiently recognized by 
Christians in general. In this way the orig- 
inal reason for the denomination's existence 
passed away but the denomination remained. 
Mind, I do not say that the historic reason 
for your denomination has passed away! I 
am speaking simply of "certain denomina- 
tions" ! Denominational anachronisms stand 
out with peculiar flagrance on the foreign 
16 



THE WORLD VIEW 

field. For instance, there was an historical 
reason on this continent for the existence of 
the Canadian Methodist Church, the Metho- 
dist North and the Methodist South. But in 
Japan where, as one of the Methodist mis- 
sionaries has said, there is no St. Lawrence 
River, and no Mason and Dixon's line, it is 
useless to perpetuate these sections of the 
Church. It is worse than useless. It is be- 
wildering and offensive to the Japanese. 
Therefore the different sections of the Metho- 
dist Church in Japan have been merged into 
one. I mention this simply as an illustration 
of the tendency towards unity that is abroad 
among the denominations and the reason for 
it. 

Now is it possible at all to forecast, under 
this first general head, ways in which the 
Association may be of service to the spirit 
that is so strongly developing in the Church? 
In the first place, the Association has an 
opportunity to demonstrate for the churches 
the fact that the recognition of the divine 
Lordship of Jesus is a sufficient basis for 
extensive cooperation in Christian work. 
The Associations have been in a high degree 
united, have carried on extensive work both 
at home and in the foreign field, and the 
17 



WORKING TOGETHER 

basis of their unity and effective cooperation 
has really been and must continue to be their 
recognition of the divine Lordship of Jesus 
Christ. The personality of Jesus Christ is so 
significant as to make relationship to him the 
most significant, fundamental and, therefore, 
unifying fact of human experience. If two 
persons agree in recognizing the divine Lord- 
ship of Jesus Christ, the Saviour, that fact 
is sufficient to bind them together, no matter 
in what other points they disagree. This 
idea was one of the great contributions made 
by the inspired genius of the first Christian 
generation — the Apostle Paul. He con- 
tended for the sufficiency of simple faith in 
Jesus Christ; that is, the surrender of the life 
to the control of Jesus Christ, the living 
Saviour. Nothing else could rise higher or 
be more fundamental. Nothing else could 
bind men more firmly or more lovingly into 
unity. The Church has been slow to follow 
the great apostle in this bold assumption. It 
has felt that men must be bound together by 
extensive creeds. It has not practically be- 
lieved that Jesus Christ is so large and pow- 
erful a personality that personal devotion to 
him could hold men together as no other 
motive in the world can. But now it is begin- 
18 



THE COHESIVE CHRIST 

ning to feel that the apostle was right. It 
will be one providential function of the Asso- 
ciation to give the Church of the next gen- 
eration convincing demonstration that it is 
safe to unite on this simple basis, that Jesus 
Christ is really a living personality powerful 
enough to hold together in orderly organiza- 
tion and effectivef work those who from their 
hearts call him Lord. We who come up from 
many sections of the Christian Church with 
our varying creeds and symbols and tempera- 
ments find no difficulty in standing close to- 
gether and moving decisively forward to the 
accomplishment of difficult undertakings on 
the basis of our common relation to Jesus 
Christ. 

The strongest bonds that ever bind men 
together are a common friend, a common 
work, a common peril, a common hope. All 
these we have and they all center in the per- 
sonality of Jesus Christ. He is our common 
Friend, he has delivered us from our common 
peril, sent us to our common work, and given 
us our common hope of the civilization of the 
endless life. Many timid churches, fearing 
to unite with others in common organization, 
will gain assurance by looking at the career 
of the Young Men's Christian Association. 
19 



WORKING TOGETHER 

Their members, who have also been members 
of the Association, will encourage their more 
timid brethren by reporting their own ex- 
perience in the Association. I am about to 
speak of more tangible and specific services 
to be rendered by the Association to the 
Church, yet I am not sure but that this is the 
greatest of them all. 

Again, the Association will help the 
churches into a closer union not alone by its 
simple doctrinal statement. It may be the 
agency which will unite them in evangelistic 
and philanthropic work. It is through union 
in work that such churches as ought to come 
together, will do so. This seems to be the 
case on the foreign field wherever they have 
come together. It has been the exigencies of 
the work that have necessitated union. Exi- 
gencies in the work certainly confront the 
churches in this country. The churches in 
this country are not making inroads upon the 
adult population by which they are sur- 
rounded. Their growth consists almost en- 
tirely of those who come to them from their 
Sunday schools. Eighty-five or even ninety 
per cent of the increase in church member- 
ship is reported to come from the Sunday 
schools, and yet the churches are surrounded 
20 



THE POTENTIALLY RELIGIOUS 

by a great mass of adults upon which they 
ought to be making a continuous and con- 
vincing impression. The idea that it is com- 
paratively useless to try to convert a man 
after the period of adolescence seems to me 
to have been greatly overworked. One rea- 
son that so few men are converted after the 
period of adolescence is that they do not 
often hear much Christian truth after that 
period, and what they do hear is not so pre- 
sented as to be likely to impress them. The 
factories and stores and offices have in them 
multitudes of non-churchgoing adults who 
are potentially religious. It is difficult for 
the churches to make a profound impression 
on the life of a village or section of a city so 
long as denominational lines are sharply 
drawn. This is true for two reasons. In the 
first place the unchurched adult population 
are bewildered and repelled by the difficulty 
of distinguishing denominational differences, 
just as the Japanese are. It is hard for them 
even to understand, and much more to sym- 
pathize with, the small points that separate 
Methodists from Presbyterians. In the 
second place no individual pastor can begin 
any thorough systematic work among the 
unchurched adult population surrounding his 
21 



WORKING TOGETHER 

church without at once treading on the toes 
of the pastor of another denomination whose 
church is on the next block. He is prac- 
tically compelled to confine his efforts to what 
he calls his own "parish," that is, the f amilies 
who are already connected with his own 
church or Sunday school. The moment he 
goes beyond these he is liable on any doorstep 
to find himself meeting pastors of one or two 
other denominations. This gives his effort 
an aspect of competition which is very dis- 
agreeable to all parties concerned and will 
probably lead them all to avoid running the 
risk of such meetings in the future. 

In the case of special revival services last- 
ing a few weeks, these pastors may unite with 
more or less success and make a combined 
effort to get in touch with the unchurched 
adult population which is the common en- 
vironment of all their churches. But these 
special services, coming only occasionally, 
constitute no adequate means of meeting the 
great need. What is demanded is some 
steady effort running all through the year 
and year after year, an effort in which com- 
petent lay members, as well as pastors, shall 
be enlisted and trained for service. This can 
22 



WHAT PASTORS CANNOT DO 

be accomplished only by means of permanent, 
continuous leadership, and no one of these 
churches can furnish such leadership. The 
Presbyterian pastor cannot go into the 
Methodist and Baptist churches of his neigh- 
borhood, and through a term of years train 
and direct the lay membership of these 
churches as well as of his own in a long and 
effective evangelistic or philanthropic cam- 
paign. And yet somebody must do just this 
thing if the churches in village or city are 
ever to make any adequate impression upon 
their unchurched environment. So far as I 
can see there is at present only one agency 
that can provide this interdenominational 
leadership, and that is the Young Men's 
Christian Association. The religious work 
director or the secretary, or some officer not 
yet invented, must be the leader in such work. 
Of course this agent of the Association must 
be a man of first-class ability and thorough 
training. He must be a man whose ability 
and training will deserve the respect of the 
pastors who are asked to follow his leader- 
ship, and surrender their strong men to his 
direction. The Associations are more and 
more getting the service of such men. What 
23 



WORKING TOGETHER 

I am describing here is not now generally 
being done. I am not asked to report what 
is being done but to forecast what may be 
done in the future. But that this is not 
wholly visionary may be easily ascertained by 
any one who will study what Augustus Nash 
is doing in the city of Cleveland, and what is 
probably being done here and there else- 
where. Such permanent, continuous coopera- 
tion in work is specially needed in little towns 
and villages where the present petty com- 
petition between weak churches is a more 
offensive scandal than in the city. Here 
there is a chance for the county work of the 
Association to do great service. In both city 
and village the Young Women's Christian 
Association will, as it develops, take its place 
beside the Men's Association. 

Such cooperation as I have described in 
city and village is absolutely and immediately 
necessary if the Church is to become the 
aggressive force it ought to be. Whether 
such cooperation would finally result in or- 
ganic union, it is not important to inquire. 
The immediate value of such service would 
be so great as to justify it no matter what 
its influence on ultimate organic church 
union might be. 

24 



TRAINING A MINISTRY 
II. 

The Association can supply and help to 
tram men for the ministry of the Church. 
The prosperity of the Church depends 
largely on her ministry. A Christian minis- 
ter who has a true prophet's soul in him can 
quicken conscience, rouse moral enthusiasms, 
and stir high resolves in the hundreds of men, 
women and children of his church. The call 
of the Church to-day is for such a ministry. 
If the Church cannot secure it, all forms of 
philanthropy and specialized Christian eff ort 
will suffer. For the Church is the great cen- 
tral organization which fosters such enter- 
prises, creates the atmosphere in which they 
thrive, and conserves the results they secure. 
If the Church grows weak, Christian mis- 
sions lose their support and their recruits. 
If the Church ceases to be a great spiritual 
power center, the Association is liable to be- 
come a social or educational club for the 
profit of well-to-do young men. A weakened 
Church means a less effective Salvation 
Army. All special religious efforts and 
philanthropic institutions are liable to suffer 
when the Church weakens. And the Church 
is sure to weaken if she does not have a 
25 



WORKING TOGETHER 

cient and able ministry. Associations cannot 
prosper without secretaries and churches 
cannot be what they ought to be without 
ministers. 

Over against this need of the Church ap- 
pears the significant fact that the Associa- 
tion movement, in its later developments, has 
so extended its organization as to touch the 
life of men from boyhood to middle age, and 
so has come largely into possession of the 
source from which ministers are supplied to 
the Church. In the boys' work it lays hands 
upon the public-school boy. In its college de- 
partment it touches the life of college men, 
and boys of the secondary schools. In the post- 
graduate work of the student department it 
enters the theological seminary and organizes 
seminary students. In its county work it is 
now entering the country districts where a 
large proportion of the ministry is produced. 
It keeps its hands upon the boys and men in 
city and country, not only during the work- 
ing months of the educational year, but 
sometimes does its most effective work in the 
boys' camps and student conferences of the 
vacation months. 

The Association has never yet realized the 
responsibility which these facts impose upon 
26 



THE RECRUITING SERVICE 

it to supply and to help train men for the 
Christian ministry. First, to increase the 
numbers of men entering the ministry. I 
recognize the fact that the Church is, to 
some extent, to blame for the lack of men in 
her ministry. How she is to blame is not 
properly to be discussed here. I recognize 
also that certain desirable results will follow 
the present lack of men in the ministry. 
What these results are this is not the place 
to discuss. But when these allowances have 
been made, it remains true that the future 
prosperity of the Church depends upon a 
very considerable increase in the number of 
strong men who come forward and offer 
themselves to the Church to be her ministers. 
As I have just said, Associations cannot 
prosper or even exist without efficient secre- 
taries. Neither can the Christian Church, as 
an organization, prosper without efficient 
ministers. Association secretaries, so alert 
on many other points, must wake up to the 
great opportunity God has given them to 
provide men for the ministry. I have heard 
it said that secretaries, realizing the great 
opportunities afforded by the secretaryship, 
have sometimes discouraged men from enter- 
ing the Christian ministry, or have repre- 
27 



WORKING TOGETHER 

sented the ministry to be a form of service in- 
ferior in point of opportunity to that of the 
secretaryship. Probably this complaint is 
not on the whole just. It does not seem to 
me necessary ever to put the various pro- 
fessions in competition with each other. 
Scores of young men come to me to talk with 
me about their life work. I never try to dis- 
suade a man from becoming a lawyer. I am 
glad to lay before him the wonderful oppor- 
tunity which the Christian lawyer has for 
hastening the development of the Kingdom 
of God. I never try to persuade a man to 
become a minister rather than a physician. 
I am glad to lay before him the wonderful 
opportunity which the Christian physician 
has to hasten the development of the King- 
dom of God. But I am concerned also to 
have him see the great contribution which a 
right-minded, well-trained Association secre- 
tary or Christian minister can make to the 
welfare of the community. It is not our con- 
cern to prove that one of these professions 
is higher than another, but only to see to it 
that the opportunities for Christian service 
afforded by each are clearly apprehended. 
Then, under the guidance of the Spirit of 
God, who doubtless wills to have Christian 
28 



ENLISTING STUDENTS 

men in all these professions, each man will 
decide in which one he can make his largest 
contribution to the real welfare of the com- 
munity; that is, to the on-coming Kingdom 
of God. 

My contention is, therefore, not that 
Association secretaries should cease pre- 
senting to boys and college students the 
opportunity afforded by the secretaryship. 
My contention is that they themselves should 
see so clearly the great contribution to be 
made by the Christian ministry to the wel- 
fare of the community, and make young men 
see it so clearly, that a due proportion may 
have a chance to hear God summon them to 
this great service. I gladly recognize the 
fact that for the past few years the leaders 
of the summer student conferences have made 
it their chief concern to present the ministry 
as a life work. At the present time no other 
agency is so effectively directing the atten- 
tion of college men to the ministry as is the 
College Department of the Association in its 
summer conferences and local ministerial in- 
stitutes. But there is need also that the en- 
tire Association movement recognize the 
vitally important relation which, by the 
providence of God, it sustains to the minis- 
29 



WORKING TOGETHER 

try. Not only college secretaries, local, state 
and international, but city secretaries and 
secretaries in the county work have a re- 
sponsibility to discharge and an opportunity 
to embrace in seeing to it that boys and 
young men of vigor and ability are informed 
about the opportunity afforded by the minis- 
try for a great life work. 

The Association can serve the Church, not 
only by being the chief source of supply for 
the ministry, but by helping to train the 
ministry. Here the Association works hand 
in hand with the theological seminary. There 
is not time here to discuss the type of min- 
ister that is demanded by modern changing 
conditions and that ought to be held before 
the minds of boys and young men who are to 
be the ministers of the next few decades. 
There is a service that can be rendered to 
the Church by the Association at this point. 
It can help to create the conception of the 
ideal minister, — virile, absolutely sincere, 
clear-headed, sympathetic, shrewd, ac- 
quainted with God and with all the life of 
men. 

On the foreign field, where religious activi- 
ties are simpler than in the complex home 
life, the real character of religious problems 
30 



ARTHUR RUGH'S MESSAGE 

is sometimes more clearly evident. As I 
write these words there is fastened up on my 
desk before me for my daily view a letter 
from Arthur Rugh of Shanghai, Student 
Association secretary of China. I quote 
from its daily message to me: "It has been 
decided that I shall spend this year, begin- 
ning October 15, working in the Christian 
schools of China. The desire of the Com- 
mittee is that three things shall be empha- 
sized: (1) The development of the Associa- 
tions in the schools by the training of the 
officers and the committees. (£) The promo- 
tion of daily Bible study. (3) The securing 
of young men to enter the native ministry. 
There will be other things to do but these 
seem to be of first importance. The three 
objects named seem to us to strike most 
directly at the problem of the leadership of 
the native Church" Clearly, the great prob- 
lem in China is the leadership of the native 
Church; that is, the ministry of the native 
Church. And the student department of the 
Association in China is setting before itself 
as its chief task the solution of this problem. 
When we have brushed aside the confusing 
details of our complex American situation, 
we see that the elemental problem is the same 
31 



WORKING TOGETHER 

here as in China. It is as Mr. Rugh sug- 
gests, "The problem of the leadership of the 
native Church;" that is, the ministry. My 
contention is that the relation of the Asso- 
ciation to the problem is also the same in 
America that it is in China. 

Surely the spirit of the living Christ that 
has wrought so wonderfully in the Young 
Men's Christian Association will make the 
Association serviceable to the Church of the 
living Christ. In no two points will that 
service be more marked than in contributing 
to the unity of the Church which our Lord 
prayed that he might see, and in furnishing 
to the Church the true strong ministerial 
leadership essential to its victorious advance. 



A SUPPLEMENT 
TO THE CHURCH 

RENO HUTCHINSON 



I A SUPPLEMENT TO THE CHURCH § 



00809933X3 HIS PAPER deals with the 
« relation between the Asso- 
ciation and the organized 
bodies of men and women 
called churches, and not 
with the Church universal. 
Indeed, the very wording of the subject for- 
bids any other interpretation, since the rela- 
tionship is described as supplementary, and 
in no sense can this term be used in regard 
to the Church universal, of which the Asso- 
ciation is a component part. 

The relationship which we are to discuss 
is supplementary. All our Association activi- 
ties have been based on this definition. From 
its inception until this day the leaders of this 
organization have never thought of it as a 
substitute for the Church; indeed, every sec- 
retary is continually demonstrating in words 
and works that such a view is erroneous, an 
activity that is made necessary by the mis- 
understanding of outsiders. An equal effort 
has been made to avoid duplicating the work 
of the churches. 

35 



WORKING TOGETHER 

That the relation of the Association to the 
Church in this country has always been that 
of a supplement is shown by the fact that the 
former has no test of its own for active mem- 
bership, but has adopted as the necessary 
condition for voting or holding office, mem- 
bership in an evangelical church. This test 
of membership was incorporated in the con- 
stitution of the first Association organized 
in the United States, at Boston, in 1851. It 
was officially approved by the North Ameri- 
can Convention of 1868. In the convention 
of 1869 it was made the basis of admission to 
representation in future conventions from 
Associations organized after that date. An- 
other significant action of this convention, 
as showing the thought of leaders of the 
movement, was the adoption of the declara- 
tion that "members of churches should hold 
their obligations to their churches as having 
a prior claim upon their sympathy and 
efforts." 

Since the convention of 1869 the "evan- 
gelical church membership test" has been 
gradually adopted, until practically all the 
Associations of North America hold to it 
to-day. So much as to the supplementary 
relation of the Association to the churches 
36 



THE CHURCH'S FUNCTION 

in the past and the present. As to the future 
— who shall say? There is some demand 
for a restatement of the evangelical church 
membership test. But this seems to be a 
desire for the reconsideration of the definition 
of the term "evangelical," rather than of 
the membership test itself. There is not the 
slightest tendency on the part of the leaders 
of the movement to make the Young Men's 
Christian Association any more independent 
of the parent organization than it is at the 
present time. If it ceases to be a supple- 
ment of the Church it will become a different 
organization, if not in name, certainly in 
character. 

Two matters must be spoken of as briefly 
as possible. First, what is the function of 
the Church? Second, what, in general, is the 
work of the Association as a supplement 
thereto? The special function of the Church 
is the development of the religious life of the 
individual; this has two aspects, the inner 
and the outer, motive and expression, relation 
to God and relation to man ; the "come" and 
the "go" of Jesus. The work of the Asso- 
ciation then, from our present viewpoint, is 
to strive for the same end, but to reach it 
not by doing what the Church is doing, but 
37 



WORKING TOGETHER 

by bringing to pass results that the Church 
is not securing. And it should be borne in 
mind that these things that the Church is 
not accomplishing, and which her supplement 
ought therefore to undertake, are of two 
kinds, those which she ought but is failing to 
do, and those which from the nature of the 
case she cannot do. Seeing merely the for- 
mer class of things we would hold to the false 
doctrine that the only reason for the exist- 
ence of the Association is the failure of the 
Church. But, seeing the whole, we perceive 
that our organization will always have its 
great work to do, though changing in char- 
acter perhaps ; for there are many things 
that the average church will never be able to 
do, and many other community activities 
which no one church ought to undertake 
single-handed, but which all in combination, 
using the Association as their natural in- 
strument, can bring about. 

From our present point of view, the men 
of a community may be divided into two 
classes, those who are already under the 
direct influence of the churches and those 
whom they are not touching. Certain 
features of the Association's activities have 
to do in equal measure with both these 



PHYSICAL AND MENTAL LIFE 

classes, for the reason that the average 
church does not undertake work of that char- 
acter. Under this head would come the phy- 
sical and educational features and a consid- 
erable part of the social life as well. By the 
churched and the unchurched alike these 
privileges are needed, and herein lies an im- 
portant part of the supplemental work of 
the Association. We said that the special 
function of the Church is the development of 
the religious life in individuals, but a sub- 
sidiary duty lies in the betterment of the 
physical and mental life of men, and for the 
performance of this work she must call in the 
Association. For lack of equipment, re- 
sources, training, the average church does 
not, and never can, do this kind of work as 
well as the Young Men's Christian Associa- 
tion. In view of this widely recognized fact 
our organization is often called the "institu- 
tional department of the Church." This is a 
correct enough statement, as far as it goes, 
but it is only a half-truth. There are some 
persons who hold that the service of the Asso- 
ciation to the churches ends here. That this 
is an erroneous view appears plainly enough 
when one comes face to face with the unsatis- 
fied religious needs of men, and realizes at 
39 



WORKING TOGETHER 

the same time the purpose and resources of 
the Young Men's Christian Association. In- 
deed, the highest function of this institution 
is to supplement the primary work of the 
churches in the development of the spiritual 
life of men. 

When we come to deal with the direct re- 
ligious work that the Association ought to 
do, we must differentiate between the two 
classes of men named above. We have ar- 
rived now at a point where a few of our good 
friends, the clergy, will part company with 
us. The leading minister of one of our large 
cities a few weeks ago expressed in a letter 
his settled conviction that the chief work of 
the Association in relation to the members of 
the churches and congregations of the city 
was educational. "The Association should 
be a sort of parochial school," he said, "for 
all the churches," and he did not refer to 
"religious education." This minister has 
stated a partial truth. If the churches are 
completely satisfying the religious needs of 
the men within their influence, then the Asso- 
ciation has no obligation religiously to those 
men. For to duplicate the work of the 
churches, or to provide a substitute for them, 
is contrary to its purpose. But if the men 
40 



DAILY BIBLE STUDY 

have any religious need that the churches 
are failing or are unable to provide for, then 
it is the business of the supplementary agency 
to occupy that breach. That there are such 
unsupplied needs, even among church men, no 
one, I think, will deny. It would be a difficult 
and an ungracious task to point out in what 
respects the churches are simply failing and 
what things are really beyond their powers, 
and it is moreover unnecessary for our pres- 
ent purpose, which is not academic, but prac- 
tical, the immediate increase of efficiency. 



Among the features of direct religious 
work which the Association ought to provide 
for church men we shall mention first of all, 
because of its supreme importance, the devel- 
opment of the habit of daily Bible study. In 
trying to express this obligation the words 
have been chosen carefully. The aim should 
be not merely to get more men into Bible 
classes, but to develop in a greater number 
of men the habit of daily study. The crying 
need of the Church to-day is for men who 
will study the Bible and for those who can 
teach it. The dryness and unfruitfulness of 
41 



WORKING TOGETHER 

the lives of multitudes of Christian men may 
be attributed to the neglect of the Word of 
God more than to any other cause. Men are 
spiritually starving in a land of plenty. 
Now, let us inquire carefully what is the need 
here: not for more Bible exposition, not for 
greater belief in the Book, but for closer 
first-hand contact with the very Word of 
God — not as someone has said, more appre- 
ciation is needed, but more appropriation. 

The Associations of North America have 
been doing magnificent work in Bible study: 
during the past six years the gain has been 
remarkable, The leap from 13,700 to 
24,000 students in 1900 to over 70,000 in 
1906 is amazing. [The number is now over 
80,000.] Men have been drawn into classes 
who were completely out of the reach of the 
churches. But for Christian men we have not 
done so well. What these men need is the 
establishment in their lives of the habit of 
daily Bible study. They are not being 
trained to this in their churches, and, we may 
justly fear that our organization is laying 
but little more emphasis upon this habit. 
Many a secretary devoutly believes that Bible 
study is the very heart of the Association's 
life, and he pushes that department until it 
42 



INTEREST IN FOOD 

enrolls several hundred students, and yet very 
few have ever caught the idea that it is the 
heart of a man's life. And we are likely to 
find that such Associations have plenty of 
so-called Bible study which is not such for 
the men enrolled, but merely Bible listening, 
or Bible discussion. Classes in which the men 
are not expected to study, or which demand 
only a little time once a week, are not doing 
the supplemental work which the church re- 
quires for her men. To be sure men are get- 
ting interested in the Bible and are learning 
a little about it. But this is not enough. In- 
terest in food will not sustain life — appro- 
priation is required. Men are interested in 
political economy and in hygiene when it is 
attractively served to them, but that is a dif- 
ferent matter from making a close study of 
economics, or getting up and exercising 
every morning before breakfast. 

The watchword of every Bible study de- 
partment ought to be "Get the habit of daily 
Bible study." If a class has been the means 
of establishing in the life of a student this 
habit it has done for him something a hun- 
dred times more valuable than the sum of all 
the information he has gained. Yet many 
Christian men take course after course in our 
43 



WORKING TOGETHER 

classes without having suggested to them the 
idea of daily study. A teacher or a course 
rarely gets from a student more than is 
asked, therefore the teachers of Christian 
men ought to expect, and courses for such 
men ought to provide for a certain amount of 
direct study of the Word, to be done every 
day by every student. Some men will form 
the priceless habit. 

One of the greatest needs of the churches 
is for men who can teach the Bible. Such 
men are sought everywhere. They cannot 
be found, because members of the church have 
not been trained for such service. They 
have been willing to let the minister serve the 
Bible to them in small portions, and the min- 
ister is probably a preacher, and not a Bible 
teacher. Where are men to be trained for 
such work? The Church itself is not doing 
it, no other organization is fitted to under- 
take it ; here then is the Association's oppor- 
tunity. The training needed for such ser- 
vice is primarily that already spoken of as 
being required by every Christian — namely, 
the kind that will fix in the life the habit of 
daily study of the Scriptures, for a Bible 
teacher must be first of all a Bible student. 
By means of normal classes these men may 
44 



THE SECRETARY'S BUSINESS 

receive further instruction, both in the prin- 
ciples and methods of teaching and in the 
subject matter which they are presenting to 
their own classes. 

The average man in the average church 
does not get much education in service. He 
gets the impression from the morning and 
evening gathering and from the Sunday 
school, if he happens to attend it, that he is 
there not to minister, but to be ministered 
unto. The Association in every city should 
be a training school for Christian workers. 
Every secretary ought to make it a part of 
his business to set men to work. The oppor- 
tunities are unlimited, and most men are will- 
ing to take a part in the service of others if 
they are shown just how to do it. But they 
need definite instruction and constant en- 
couragement. It takes much time and re- 
quires the transfer of vital force from one 
life to another to transform a respectable 
church member into a fighting soldier in the 
army of Christ, but is there any result more 
worthy of the expenditure of time and en- 
ergy? It is the privilege of the secretary to 
surround himself with a little group of chosen 
men as Jesus did, and then to coax the po- 
tential good and force that lies in each into 
45 



WORKING TOGETHER 

actuality. When men have become strong 
and capable in service, shall the Association 
begrudge them to the churches for which 
they have been developed? 

Many of the smaller churches have no 
young men's Bible class, chiefly because no 
one has the courage or the knowledge to start 
one. A group of men representing different 
churches may be trained by the Association, 
and then the force of the whole group 
brought to bear upon the establishment of 
classes in one place after another. Some- 
times the Association will furnish not only 
their training, but even a leader for such a 
class. By a well-timed word a secretary may 
direct a newcomer who is ready to do Chris- 
tian service, to a small church where his 
presence will count for tenfold more than in 
the big downtown church whither he would 
naturally drift. 

II. 

There are doubtless still a few ministers, 
and perhaps even a handful of lay leaders, 
who would say "hands off" to the Young 
Men's Christian Association when an attempt 
is made to do religious work for the men in 
the churches over which they preside. But 
46 




THE AVERAGE MAN 

there is almost no difference of opinion as 
to our obligation to do such work for the 
men who are yet outside the influence of the 
churches. 

Into its own buildings the Association 
draws great numbers of men who rarely go 
to church. It attracts them because it pro- 
vides not only what they need, but what they 
desire. Men need education, but only a few 
will pay what it costs to gain it ; when, how- 
ever, the night classes appear as a means of 
securing a better position and a larger wage, 
men enter them; they want these tilings. 
Every one needs physical culture, but the 
average man will take it only when it appears 
in the social class form, with plenty of games 
intermingled — they want that. Religion is 
needed, but it is so difficult to dress it up in 
the form of something that men feel the want 
of, that many come and go in the educational, 
physical, and social life of the institution 
without being affected by the "religious 
atmosphere." There is a phrase that is made 
to cover a multitude of our sins. The secre- 
tary recognizes the obligation he owes to the 
Church and to the individual member to 
bring to him the gospel of Christ, but in his 
careful supervision of the privileges for which 
47 



WORKING TOGETHER 

the member pays his money, he fails to make 
much provision for the direct religious activi- 
ties. And then he consoles himself and his 
directors with the thought that the men in 
the building are in the midst of a "religious 
atmosphere," and are being unconsciously 
affected by the "pervading religious spirit." 
Let us not deceive ourselves — no man will get 
religion out of the air. A member of one 
Association invited a friend to join, who ob- 
jected to the religious character of the or- 
ganization. He replied to him: "I have 
been a member two years and no one ever 
talked religion to me." That young man had 
the right of the matter. He did not want to 
be infected with religion, but he had not the 
slightest fear of catching it from any atmos- 
phere. He was only afraid that some man 
who had the contagious kind would get too 
close to him. And that is exactly what the 
Association must provide. There can be no 
religious atmosphere except from the pres- 
ence of religious men. The pervading re- 
ligious spirit must be fostered and given ex- 
pression by means of definite religious activi- 
ties. There should be a well-planned attempt 
to bring the claims of Christ before every 
man who puts himself under the influence of 
48 



FOLLOWING MEN UP 

the Association. This can only be accom- 
plished by the organized effort of Christian 
men in every department. To bring the gos- 
pel of Christ to the personal attention of 
every member is difficult to accomplish, it is 
a thing that is not now being done, and yet 
is anything short of this worthy of an or- 
ganization which bears the name of Christ? 

As a supplement to the Church the Asso- 
ciation ought continually to be bringing new 
men into church membership. As a matter 
of fact this is being done, but not to a degree 
commensurate with the opportunity or the 
obligation. One of the greatest difficulties 
that the secretary has to meet is the or- 
ganization of his forces so as to "follow up" 
the man who has shown special interest, or 
the lad whose mother has commended her boy 
to the secretary's care, or the newcomer with 
a church membership back home, until he is 
safely anchored in the local church. It is due 
to the man and to the church to see that this 
is done, and to be satisfied with nothing less. 
It is not enough to send the names and ad- 
dresses of these persons to the pastors, and 
then criticize the ministers because they do 
not gather in these men. It is the function 
of the supplemental agency to do what the 
49 



WORKING TOGETHER 

primary organization is not doing. In order 
to accomplish the desired result the close co- 
operation of pastors will, of course, be neces- 
sary, but in addition the aid of a group of 
faithful laymen representing different 
churches must be secured. Frequently the 
only effective method is a series of visits at 
the boarding houses or homes of the men and 
for this purpose the constant service of some 
of the best men in the Association, of whom 
the secretary may well be one, will be re- 
quired. If a few strong Christians would 
devote Monday evenings to brief friendly 
calls upon a chosen list of men, the results 
at the end of a year would be magnificent. 



III. 



Thousands of men every year receive the 
gospel from the Association who are preju- 
diced against all religion, because they have 
seen types of it to the exemplars of which 
Christ would say, "Depart from me, I never 
knew you." If this prejudice is to be broken 
down the message must have the ring of sin- 
cerity and truth, and the masculine quality, 
the note of strength and accomplishment, 
must be predominant. It is vitally impor- 
50 



OUTSIDE THE BUILDING 

tant, therefore, that the religious meeting, 
whether in the auditorium or in the shop, be 
guarded from becoming the promulgating 
center for all kinds of strange doctrines. No 
ethical or social teaching can ever be substi- 
tuted in the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation for the saving gospel of Jesus 
Christ. 

In the coming years an increasingly large 
proportion of the men under the Associa- 
tion's influence will be touched outside of the 
building. At last a Christian organization 
has learned the lesson that the men of a city 
can never be gathered into a few meeting 
places to be preached to. In order to preach 
the gospel to men, the preacher must go 
where the men are. Having grasped this 
principle, the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation is supplementing the work of the 
churches by bringing to a growing number 
of men in the midst of the scenes of their 
daily toil or in their homes, or wherever nat- 
ural groupings are found, the religious teach- 
ing which these men will not go anywhere to 
hear. We are at length beginning to see, as 
through a glass, darkly, that the aim of our 
work is not simply to get a few hundreds or 
thousands of men into Bible classes, or evan- 
51 



WORKING TOGETHER 

gelistic meetings or shop classes, but that 
nothing short of bringing Jesus Christ to all 
the men of a city will fulfill our obligation. 
It is only as the men in the shop and home 
are followed up by the manifestation of sin- 
cere and friendly interest on the part of the 
leader, and as they are brought into cordial 
relationship with neighboring churches, that 
the largest results can be conserved. 



IV. 



We must touch briefly upon the Associa- 
tion's supplementary work for boys. Our 
organization is discovering its power to help 
the Church in the solution of the vexed "boy 
problem" to an extent undreamed of ten 
years ago. This feature has come to be 
vastly important from our point of view, 
first, because through the numerous attrac- 
tive features of the institution we draw many 
boys who have seldom gone to church and 
many others over whom the church has lost 
its influence ; and, second, because the Asso- 
ciation can present a type of Christianity, 
masculine and operative, which it is difficult 
for the Sunday school or the Church itself to 
52 



WORK FOR BOYS 

bring before the boy. It becomes incumbent 
upon our organization, therefore, to see that 
both these possibilities become actualities — 
that boys are not only gathered in, but that, 
somehow, Christianity in its real character as 
a man's working religion comes plainly into 
their view. In the churches, as in the schools 
and at home, boys are taught chiefly by 
women, and are seldom offered the oppor- 
tunity to express in concrete action the ideas 
that they receive. The Association, by se- 
curing for the boys the companionship and 
instruction of strong Christian men, and by 
putting in their way opportunities for active 
work for others, can help many boys to be 
the natural Christians that God intends them 
to be. Our leaders are recognizing, in regard 
to boys as well as men, that the Association's 
influence and activities must extend far be- 
yond its own walls if it would take its right- 
ful place in the city's life. The boys of a 
city cannot be gathered into any building 
that the Association can erect. Other centers 
for its work must be found, and the churches 
are natural places for this purpose. Many 
of them have buildings lying unused most of 
the time, which can readily be adapted to the 
purposes of a boys' club, and a large service 
53 



WORKING TOGETHER 

can be rendered by starting and sustaining 
effective organizations of this kind. Such a 
club is more valuable to the Church than the 
work in the Association building, in this re- 
spect that it brings the boys into the Church 
itself, where they ought to be, but it is usually 
less effective on the whole, because it touches 
the boy for a shorter time, and not on so 
many sides of his life. It must be remem- 
bered, too, that these church clubs are far 
easier to organize than to maintain, and that 
Association will do wrong which sets a num- 
ber of them going without making sure that 
men are secured and trained to keep them in 
active and increasing operation. Their per- 
manent leaders should be connected, if possi- 
ble, with the churches in which they are or- 
ganized. 



The work of the Young Men's Christian 
Association, like that of the Church, is pri- 
marily a work for and with individuals. We 
are told that as an organization we are now 
awakening to a larger degree of social con- 
sciousness, and that social service is to be- 
come our watchword. While there is un- 
54 



PASTOR AND SECRETARY 

questionably a large value in a greater real- 
ization of the Association's obligation to so- 
ciety it must never be forgotten that it is 
only through the redemption of the indi- 
vidual that society can finally be wholly re- 
deemed. Because of this fact we have limited 
our discussion of the increased efficiency of 
the Association as a supplement to the 
Church to the work that this organization 
ought to do for individuals. But one matter 
must not be omitted, both because of its im- 
portance and because it is so often over- 
looked, namely the Association's obligation 
for service to the churches of the city as 
organizations. Many secretaries, uncon- 
sciously, and some avowedly, take the posi- 
tion that their business is to run the Young 
Men's Christian Association, and the business 
of the pastors is to run the churches. If any 
minister does not know enough to take ad- 
vantage of the opportunities that the Asso- 
ciation affords for him and for his people, 
that is his misfortune and none of the secre- 
tary's business ; and if that minister does not 
seem to know how to get effectiveness in his 
church, still less is that the secretary's affair. 
The man who keeps such an attitude has lost 
sight of the fact that our institution is a 
55 



WORKING TOGETHER 

supplement to the churches. As such it owes 
something to each one of them, and to them 
all. In some communities one of the most 
important forms of service that the secre- 
taries can render is to unify the work of the 
ministers and the churches. Sometimes a 
strained relationship exists between the re- 
ligious forces of a city, minimizing their in- 
fluence. The secretary of the Young Men's 
Christian Association is often the man to 
bring about a better condition of affairs. 
Non-partisan, having the same relation to all 
the churches, and having the same interests 
with all the ministers, his is a strategic posi- 
tion. As a rule, the remedy for such an un- 
fortunate condition cannot be found in a per- 
sonal appeal for friendliness made to indi- 
vidual ministers, but rather in bringing about 
unostentatiously some kind of a union move- 
ment. This ought to be a sustained effort, 
and not merely a few weeks' revival, for it 
takes time to accomplish the desired result. 
A laymen's campaign for the men of the city, 
organized with the ministers behind it may 
serve well this purpose, and at the same time 
enlist many business and professional men in 
active service, and carry the gospel from the 
lips of laymen to many ears. Such an or- 
56 



THE DEFINITE PLANS 

ganization might include in its purpose the 
carrying on of men's meetings in different 
churches on Sunday nights or afternoons, 
and a special summer work for men, and 
many other forms of activity. In a move- 
ment of this sort, while our organization and 
its forces may well be at the center of it, 
better results can usually be obtained by 
keeping the Association's name somewhat in 
the background and letting it appear purely 
as a general interdenominational effort led by 
the pastors and laymen. Work of this na- 
ture for the churches is one of the most deli- 
cate phases of the secretary's manifold du- 
ties. Notwithstanding its delicacy and its 
occasional unpleasantness, the opportunity 
for usefulness in this direction is too great to 
be shirked. 



VI. 



There remains one topic which we must 
touch upon, namely the form in which the sup- 
plementary relation to the churches ought 
to be expressed. In the past this matter has 
been left largely to take care of itself. 
There have been as yet no principles formu- 
lated by which the individual Association or 
57 



WORKING TOGETHER 

its secretary can be guided in seeking a form 
of connection by means of which to cooperate 
most effectively with the ministers and 
churches. A recent investigation made by 
the writer among twenty-four of our largest 
and most important Associations shows that 
only two of this number had at that time 
any definitely planned form of cooperation. 
The information received from the others, 
for the most part, was to the effect that there 
was the "most cordial relation" between the 
ministers and the secretaries, that the secre- 
tary belonged to the ministerial union and 
figured largely in interdenominational move- 
ments, and similar statements. But there 
were only two cities out of this number, and 
indeed we have reason to believe that there 
are not more than half a dozen in the United 
States, where the Association and the 
churches, as organizations, have any officially 
recognized connection. The ministers and 
other leaders of the churches, as such, have 
no voice in the work of the Young Men's 
Christian Association, which so closely con- 
cerns them. 

But the time has come when the wise secre- 
tary will no longer ignore the form which the 
Association's relation to the Church should 
58 



THIS COLOSSUS 

take. In some cities our institution is doing 
as much religious work as a dozen churches, 
it is accomplishing the things that many pas- 
tors would like to do, and claiming as its 
own the distinctive work for men ; it is using 
as its workers, and sometimes employing to 
the full limit of their time, church members 
whose first obligation is to the Church. It is 
no wonder that some pastors are saying, 
"What is this colossus which gobbles up my 
best men and says that it is all for the good 
of the Church?" It surely is not without 
significance that some of the strongest minis- 
ters in many cities, among them the Asso- 
ciation's warmest friends, are saying that the 
pastors of the city ought to bear a closer 
relationship to the religious work of the or- 
ganization. Surely, if this work for men in 
a community can, as we believe, be carried on 
most effectively by the Association, and if 
our organization is a supplement to the 
Church, seeking to give churchmen needed 
training, and to bring non-church-goers 
within her influence, surely the pastors, as 
leaders of the churches, ought to have some- 
thing closer than the ordinary "cordial" re- 
lation. It is the writer's conviction that one 
of the greatest forms of service that the Asso- 
59 



WORKING TOGETHER 

ciation will render in the next few years will 
be to help in the coordination of the religious 
forces of our communities. Through wise 
secretaries and laymen a practical federation 
of the churches may be brought about in 
some cities, the Association being the natural 
and effective instrument for men's work. 

We will not venture to go into details as 
to the form that the planned relationship be- 
tween Association and churches should take. 
It is far more important that the need for a 
definite and effective cooperation be recog- 
nized, and that the insufficiency, for this pur- 
pose, of mere friendliness and cordiality be 
appreciated. But a few suggestions may be 
offered in conclusion. Three forms of rela- 
tionship are possible between Association 
and Church: 

1. The two may be entirely separate, 
each seeking in its own way to accomplish its 
own purposes. 

2. There may be an organic connection 
between them, the activities of the Associa- 
tion being directed by the ministerial union, 
or some other body representative of the 
churches. 

3. There may be cooperation between 
them — two separate organizations working 

60 



ORGANIZED CO-OPERATION 

together by different methods for the same 
end. The first form implies duplicated effort 
and wasteful competition. The second, if 
ever desirable, would be so only when the 
churches and ministers are so indissolubly 
united in purpose that jealousy and friction 
were forever eliminated. The third form is 
unquestionably the preferable one. It has 
always been recognized as such, and has been 
sought in most cities. But the cooperation 
has been for the most part so haphazard as 
to be unworthy of the name. In order to be 
effective, it must be definitely planned — the 
term "organized cooperation" may be used 
to express this desirable relationship. It 
may be through the appointment by the min- 
isterial union of a committee of pastors to 
have a close advisory relation to the religious 
work of the Association, or it may be in some 
better way yet to be devised, but when the 
churches and the Association begin to work 
together in carefully organized and sustained 
cooperation then will be reached a degree of 
efficiency in the making of Christian men 
that is otherwise unattainable. 



61 



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JUL 6 »908 



